Romanian raped woman 11 days after arriving in UK having just been released from prison

Florin Moraru beat and raped woman he met in Kettering nightclub on New Year's Eve.

Florin Moraru was convicted of raping a woman in Kettering in the early hours of New Year's Day 2017Northamptonshire Police

A Romanian man brutally attacked and raped a woman 11 days after arriving in the UK, having been released early from a five-year prison sentence in his homeland.

Northampton Crown Court heard how Florin Moraru punched a woman repeatedly in the face after she left a nightclub in Kettering, Northamptonshire, where she had been celebrating New Year's Eve.

The 25-year-old's advances had been spurned by his victim earlier that night but he waited until she left the club then crept up behind her in a churchyard and launched a ruthless sex attack as she pleaded for him to leave her alone.

Moraru pleaded guilty to rape and causing actual bodily harm and was jailed for 10 years and eight months on Tuesday (18 April).

During the hearing it emerged that the rapist had been in the UK just 11 days after a court in his homeland released him on license from a prison.

It was stated that Moraru had been sentenced to five years in prison in 2014 for attacking another woman during a violent robbery, reports The Sun.

Vicious attack in churchyard

The court heard how in the early hours of 1 January, Moraru followed his victim through the town before he caught up with her in a church courtyard and punched her in the face. She fell to the floor screaming "No, no, no!"

It was told that she was punched seven or eight times and left with serious facial injuries and fractures.

Passers-by who heard the incident called police officers, who arrived at the scene at 5.15am. A DNA sample matched Moraru's and he was arrested at a car wash where he worked in Corby, Northants.

Sentencing, the judge, Rupert Mayo said: "It was plain to anybody that she did not want your company.

"You waited, you were a minute behind her as you followed her into a churchyard. In the churchyard you brutally raped her and used your fists to smash her face in."

Pestered for sex

The court heard how Moraru pestered the victim for sex earlier on inside the nightclub after the pair had kissed inside the venue.

Nicola Moore, prosecuting, said, according to the Daily Telegraph: "The defendant came up to her and tried to kiss her and she kissed him back.

"She went outside for a cigarette and he pestered for sex. She said 'No,' and went back into the club.

"He followed and asked her to go with him so they could have sex. She said it was never going to happen."

Moraru had initially denied causing the injuries to the woman and said the sex was consensual before later admitting the sexual attack.

Moore added: "She said that she felt responsible for what happened and felt physically sick when she thought about it.

"She indicated that she does not like to go out after dark and insists that she is accompanied."

Moraru has been made the subject of an indefinite Sexual Harm Prevention Order and made to sign the sex offenders' register for life.